Orientation Week

Kate, Katie, Liz, Amanda, Amanda, Ken and Laura at Marios Apartments
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Orientation Week Started on January 27th, a Sunday. We met at Global Learning Semesters office to drop off our computers so they would be security protected and connected to WiFi. We also dropped off our passports for copies and took student ID card pictures.

We then went over to the University of Nicosia where the longest day commenced. We sat in a room from 11am-5pm listening to the founder of Global Learning Semesters, Antonis Polemitis talk about safety, cell phones, independent travel, history of Cyprus, classes and everything. We had pizza hut for lunch...haha who knew I would be having pizza hut in Cyprus...I'm not going to make a habit out of that...I want Greek food! After we finished for the day with orientation, all 75 of us met at a Greek restaurant called Prosilion for a welcome dinner! It was on GLS (Global Learning Semesters) and it was set up like buffet type thing with tons of food choices. I tried some of everything and I loved it! YUMMY greek food! They gave us two bottles of wine per table to start and kept coming back with more! It was really fun and a good time. We were there for 2 and a half hours and then walked a short distance to Marios apartments where other students on the program live and had a party. we played beer pong with glass cups which was an impossible game because it doesnt work, the ping pong balls just bounce off the cups!! :) and we all just hung out and chilled. Overall it was a good time. I met a ton of people!!!!! We came home to our apartment and chilled with some people and ended up staying up most of the night!!  We paid for that the next day when we had to get up at 7am for a tour of the University of Nicosia at 9:30am.

Laura (my roommate) and Devin (guys across the street)
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Monday, January 28th was a really chill day. It rained in Nicosia today! Which is an amazing thing because Cyprus has sun 333 days out of the year. It is the sunniest country in the world!!! and as wonderful as that sounds it has bad consequences in the summer because they tend to run out of water!! We had our tour at 9:30am of the University and since the University is only three very small buildings, the main building, where my classes will be, the Europa building, and the Millenium building. It wasnt a long tour at all. My roommates and I came back to our apartment and they took naps while I finished my personal statement for law school and submitted my law school applications! no turning back now. I hope it all goes well for me!!! I'm definitly going to bed really early tonight. It's almost seven pm and I'll probably go to bed within the hour. pathetic i know, but I need to get on track.

Laura, Katie and Me at Marios apartments
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Tuesday, January 29th..Orientation continues. I slept until 8:30am, so for 13 and half hours!!!! It was wonderful. Today we went to the Cyprus Museum in Nicosia. This museum houses Archaeological Treasures of Cyprus and contain 14 galleries of original art pieces from the 8th millennium B.C. to the end of the Antiquity. This museum displays the material cultural heritage of of Cyprus such as the pottery, jewelry, sculptures, coins, bronzes, etc, covering all periods of Cypriot culture, from Neolithic period through the Bronze age, the Iron Age and the Graeco-Roman period, is preserved and exhibited in the Cyprus Museum. We saw marble statues of Zeus aka Jupiter and Aphrodite aka Venus. It was fun to see all of the sculptures and pottery. see pictures on here of the museum!!!

David and Me on our way to learn Greek
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Later during the day we had a Greek class and learned some Greek language. I plan on getting a handout with tons of phrases and the greek alphabet so i will start to put some greek words and what not on here. You guys can learn too!!!!! :)

I made dinner for my roommates tonight, pasta. it was delicious, then later we are going out to a bar named Ibanhoz. should be a good time! my entire orientation week is going to be on this one entry so keep checking back for updates....

Wednesday, January 30th. We were up most of the night again here. It was a blast! Today we went to a presentation by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at 10:30am. He welcomed us to Cyprus and spoke for a couple of hours about the Turkish/Cypriot relationship. In the middle of his presentation, it was so windy a window flew open and ripped off its hinges and broke! It was insane and really funny, but then we were all cold for the remainder of the presentation. Then we were off to a Greek Cooking class at 12:30! It was great! They gave us hand outs with lots of recipes and they cooked Keftedes (fried meatballs), ravioles with halloumi cheese and grilled halloumi cheese in pita bread. It was delicious!!! Then we begin a scavenger hunt at 4pm that takes place all around Nicosia! I'm really excited, we are going to win!!! If we win we get $100 gift certificate to GLS's favorite restaurant in Cyprus. Tonight we are going to a Restaurant in downtown Nicosia called Xefoto Restaurant. In Nicosia everything closes down at 2pm on wednesdays. So everyone takes the afternoon off and then goes out downtown at night. Except its a lot different here. In Cyprus, everyone goes out to dinner at 9pm or 10pm, then they hang out for a while and maybe go to a cafe and have coffee. Then around 1am everyone goes to the bars and drinks into the night, most Cypriots dont get drunk in public like us Americans but they still go out all night! So all of us plan on experiencing that tonight!!

Ken and Stephanie at lunch
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Ok so what really happened on wednesday was this...we had the scavenger hunt and were doing really well until we had to take a cab downtown in the dark. Then we decided we werent going to mess around with that and we were dropped off at the restauarant Xefoto. It wasnt time to meet up with everyone and eat so we went to a tea/bar lounge called Brew. It was a really cute place with couches all over, in a really chill relaxing atmosphere.  I shared a bottle of wine with Kate and Merry and then we went to the restaurant for dinner. Everyone was there by the time we got there...all 75 of us plus other Cypriot diners. Merry, Laura, Mandy, Devin and I sat in the corner and order traditional Cyprus meze's. A Cyprus meze consists of 13-18 small dishes. It is an assorted variety of small quantities of delicious traditional dishes, served cold and hot appetizers, main course dishes, desserts and traditional cooked fruits in syrup accompanied with Greek Coffee. The cold appetizers consisted of a village salad which is tomatoes, cucumbers, fresh corainder, black olives, radishes, capers, sweet peppers and my favorite, feta cheese!! Then we had bread with a series of dips: Tahini dip (based on sesame) YUMMY!, Tarama dip (fish roe) ICK!, Tzatziki or Talattouri (yogurt-dip with cucumber) DELICIOUS, Melintzanosalata (eggplant dip) GOOD!, and then green olvies with crushed dry corainder seeds. I hate olives so I wasnt a fan but I did eat some of them. Then for hot appetizers we had grilled Halloumi cheese inside pita bread. Then for our main dishes we had Sheftalies (grilled minced meat rolls in caul), Kleftiko (Lamb cooked in traditonal oven), Keftedes (fried meatball) yummy!!! and Afelia (pork-red dry wine and dried crushed corainder seeds).Then for dessert we had traditional cooked fruits in syrup, I honestly have no idea what they were. One of them was really tasty and the other horrible!!! If you guys would like to make any of this at home you can go to www.cychefs.com and find traditional greek recipes!! Overall the meal took us two and a half hours!!! It was nuts. It was really cool and fun to relax and talk and not have a care in the world and sit there for all that time, but I could never live permanently on island time, as the Cypriots say. I couldnt do it. I love fast paced! but this is a wonderful change. During dinner the whole restaurant got up and danced as soon as the music came on! Including many of the Americans in our group. We danced for awhile and then went back to our meals! it was great! :) After dinner we went back to Brew and I drank absinthe for the first time. I had a whole glass and it was horrible! I was not a huge fan! This anise flavored drink derived from wormwood is never going to be on my list of things to drink frequently but as you got towards the bottom you could taste the sugar they mixed in it more and so therefore it was better, i was buzzed after 3 sips. I loved that part! After we were done at Brew, we went to a bar called New Division. It was hidden on this little street and surrounded by a bunch of trees and a little gate. If we didnt have locals with us, we never would have found it! This place reminded me of a house party with a bar. That is a perfect description. Around 15 people from our group was there and we all drank for hours and did shots. It was a lot of fun and really chill. Our bartender was really cool. She gave us a free shot. Everyone was too drunk to call cabs so I took the liberty of doing that for everyone because I was doing good. I called cabs and one driver showed up and we have a discount card for a specific cab company and the driver was being a jerk and wouldnt take it so my roommates and I got out and waited. I ended up going back with Devin, a guy on our trip from PA and then the girls waited for the next cab. Devin and I went to a 24 hour bakery called Zorbaz. We were really hungry so it was perfect!! Then I met my roommates back at out apartment and went to bed! It was alot of fun and great to hang out with everyone! Another amazing day, even though it was the coldest day Cyprus has had in 50 years, dropping down to 35-38 degrees! Figures that would happen once we all got here! haha

Mandy (my roommate) and Laurie
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Thursday January 31st, Today was the perfect day to sleep in. We dont have anything going on until 1:15 today. Today we have a lecture on Ancient Cypriot History until 2:45pm and then a break for lunch and another lecture on an Introduction to Cyprus Geography from 3:05-4:30, and then we are done for the day! The prof who gave us an introduction to Cyprus Geography is the same guy who teaches European Geography, a class I will be taking. He was really cool and funny so I cannot wait to have him as a professor. After lectures Laura, Devin, Jason, Anthony, John, and I went to Gyromania. A small restaurant on October 28th st. I had a gyro for the first time in my life and it was delicious. I loved it. Devin has already been there three times and they have his order memorized!! haha Our trip tomorrow to Kyrenia or Troodos has been cancelled because of the the ice and snow in the mountains and hopefully is being rescheduled to Saturday.

Mandy, Laura, Laurie, and Merry
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Friday we have to pick up our books because classes start on Monday! I'm a dork but I cannot wait for classes to start!!!! Today we are going to the Turkish side with a group of people to visit Famagusta. Famagusta is a deserted ghost town on the coast. I cannot wait to see it. I'm going to create a new entry for this trip.

Orientation week is over!!!!!!!!!!! It was a good first week!

Kalimera!!!! (Good day)